Early evidence of cerebral grey matter volume changed after treatment in neuroleptic naïve, newly diagnosed schizophrenia

Abstract

Background: Antipsychotic drugs influence brain morphology in schizophrenia and usually require 3 weeks for marked effect. We used a comprehensive computational morphometry analysis to investigate brain volumetric changes after 3 weeks of antipsychotic exposure in a prospective, longitudinal, cohort of anti-psychotic-naïve individuals newly diagnosed with schizophrenia.

Methods: Voxel-based morphometric (VBM) analysis was performed on magnetic resonance images (MRI) of the brain acquired before (t = 0) and after 3 weeks (t = 3 weeks) of antipsychotic treatment in 17 individuals with first-episode schizophrenia who had never received anti-psychotic treatment (7 males, 10 females). SPM (Statistical Parametric Mapping) 99 software using paired t test s was used to perform VBM analysis of greymatter volumetric differences between t = 0 and t = 3 weeks.

Results:After 3 weeks of antipsychotic medication, significant clusters of volume excess in greymatter were detected in bilateral caudate, right parahippocampal gyrus and right postcentral gyrus. Clusters of volume deficits were detected in left superior frontal gyrus. Region-of-interest (ROI) confirmed caudate volumetric increased afterearly medication.

Conclusions: Brain volumetric changes after 3 weeks medication suggests that drug-mediated neural and brain plasticity may occur during clinical recovery.